Lawmakers Renew Calls for Action Against Falun Gong Persecution as Senate Weighs Organ-Harvesting Bills

Sen. Todd Young and Rep. Pat Ryan linked America’s 250th anniversary to religious freedom as a Senate bill targeting CCP organ harvesting cleared committee.

(Left) Sen. Todd Young (R-Ind.) and (Right) Rep. Pat Ryan (D-N.Y.) sent statements to Minghui.org reaffirming support for Falun Gong practitioners’ freedom of belief. Public Domain

Sen. Todd Young (R-Ind.) and Rep. Pat Ryan (D-N.Y.) used America’s 250th anniversary to renew their support for Falun Gong practitioners, sending statements to Minghui.org, a website documenting firsthand accounts of practitioners.

Young said America was founded on “the principle that every person is endowed with inherent dignity and the freedom to live according to their conscience,” according to his statement.

He said religious liberty and the rule of law have guided his work in the Senate, including his support for legislation targeting the ruling Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP’s) persecution of Falun Gong.

Falun Gong, also known as Falun Dafa, is a spiritual practice centered on the principles of truth, compassion, and tolerance. Introduced to the public in China in the early 1990s, it gained widespread popularity, reaching between 70 million and 100 million practitioners by the end of the decade, according to official estimates at the time.

In July 1999, the CCP, fearing that Falun Gong’s popularity threatened the regime’s power, launched a brutal campaign to eradicate the practice. Since then, many have suffered arbitrary detention, forced labor, torture, and even death from forced organ harvesting.

“Congress must continue exposing and sanctioning those responsible for the CCP’s human rights abuses,” Young said. He also called for stronger protections against CCP intimidation of people in the United States.

Ryan, an Army veteran, cast his support in terms of the freedoms he served to protect. “I risked my life in combat to protect fundamental American freedoms—that absolutely includes the freedom to practice your religion without fear of persecution,” he said, according to Minghui.

One Bill Moves

The House passed H.R. 1540, the Falun Gong Protection Act, unanimously in May 2025; Ryan was an original cosponsor. However, it has sat in the Senate Foreign Relations Committee since May 6, 2025 without a vote. A Senate companion, S. 817, introduced by Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) in March 2025 and cosponsored by Young since last summer has been stuck in the same committee just as long.

A third bill has advanced. The committee voted June 17 to send S. 4009, the Falun Gong and Victims of Forced Organ Harvesting Protection Act, to the full Senate with an amendment—one of 24 bills the panel advanced that day. Cruz and Sen. Jeff Merkley (D-Ore.) introduced the bill in March, and Young joined as a cosponsor on June 9, eight days before the committee vote.

S. 4009 extends sanctions and reporting requirements to all victims of forced organ harvesting in China, not only Falun Gong practitioners.

“The Chinese Communist Party operates a brutal, state-sponsored organ harvesting industry that targets people for their faith,” Cruz said when he and Merkley introduced the bill in March. After the committee vote, Cruz said the bill had passed unanimously and urged the Senate to “swiftly pass” it.

Merkley said in the introduction announcement that China’s “campaign of repression and human rights abuses continue to have horrific consequences, including reports of forced organ harvesting from vulnerable groups across the PRC,” using the acronym for China’s official name, the People’s Republic of China.

All three bills would hold the CCP’s abuses to account by directing the president to sanction—through asset freezes, transaction bans, and visa revocation—foreign nationals found to have knowingly facilitated forced organ harvesting in China, and by requiring the State Department to report on China’s organ-transplant system.

CCP’s Reach Extends to the US

Young’s warning about intimidation on U.S. soil echoes concerns raised by the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom (USCIRF).

USCIRF said in 2025 that Chinese authorities have targeted religious communities in the diaspora—including Falun Gong practitioners, Uyghur Muslims, Tibetan Buddhists, Protestant Christians, and others. The commission listed tactics that include surveillance, harassment, coerced return to China, and threats against family members still in the country.

An independent London-based “China Tribunal” chaired by Geoffrey Nice concluded in June 2019, after an approximately 18‑month inquiry, that forced organ harvesting from prisoners of conscience in China has been committed for years “on a significant scale,” finding that Falun Gong practitioners have been one–and probably the main–source of organ supply. The tribunal later set out these findings in a full written judgment released in March 2020.

The S. 4009 bill has no scheduled floor date, while H.R. 1540 and S. 817 remain in committee.